A controversial, estrogen-like chemical in plastic could be harming the development of children’s brains and reproductive organs, a federal health agency concluded in a report released Tuesday. The National Toxicology Program, part of the National Institutes of Health, concluded that there was ‘some concern’ that fetuses, babies and children were in danger because bisphenol A, or BPA, harmed animals at low levels found in nearly all human bodies. An ingredient of polycarbonate plastic, BPA is one of the most widely used synthetic chemicals in industry today. It can seep from hard plastic beverage containers such as baby bottles, as well as from liners in cans containing food and infant formula. The federal institute is the first government agency in the U.S. to conclude that low levels of BPA could be harming humans. Its findings will be used to help regulators at federal and state environmental agencies to develop policies governing its use. The draft report followed an 18-month review that was fraught with allegations of bias, heated disputes among scientists and the firing of a consulting company with financial ties to the chemical industry. Some scientists suspect that exposure early in life disrupts hormones and […]
Today’s edition is devoted entirely to various views and aspects of the fuel vs food struggle that has been growing, and is now becoming a powerful moral challenge.
Sixty countries backed by the World Bank and most UN bodies yesterday called for radical changes in world farming to avert increasing regional food shortages, escalating prices and growing environmental problems. But in a move that has led to the US, UK, Australia and Canada not yet endorsing the report, the authors said GM technology was not a quick fix to feed the world’s poor and argued that growing biofuel crops for automobiles threatened to increase worldwide malnutrition. The report was issued as the UN’s World Food Programme called for rich countries to contribute $500m (£255m) to immediately address a growing global food crisis which has seen staple food price rises of up to 80% in some countries, and food riots in many cities. According to the World Bank, 33 countries are now in danger of political destabilisation and internal conflict following food price inflation. The authors of the 2,500-page International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development [IAASTD] say the world produces enough food for everyone, yet more than 800 million people go hungry. ‘Food is cheaper and diets are better than 40 years ago, but malnutrition and food insecurity threaten millions,’ they write. ‘Rising […]
We drive, they starve. The mass diversion of the North American grain harvest into ethanol plants for fuel is reaching its political and moral limits. ‘The reality is that people are dying already,’ said Jacques Diouf, of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). ‘Naturally people won’t be sitting dying of starvation, they will react,’ he said. The UN says it takes 232kg of corn to fill a 50-litre car tank with ethanol. That is enough to feed a child for a year. Last week, the UN predicted ‘massacres’ unless the biofuel policy is halted. We are all part of this drama whether we fill up with petrol or ethanol. The substitution effect across global markets makes the two morally identical. Mr Diouf says world grain stocks have fallen to a quarter-century low of 5m tonnes, rations for eight to 12 weeks. America – the world’s food superpower – will divert 18pc of its grain output for ethanol this year, chiefly to break dependency on oil imports. It has a 45pc biofuel target for corn by 2015. The EU has targeted a 5.75pc biofuel share by 2010, though that may change. Europe’s farm ministers are […]
LIMA. PERU — As wheat and rice prices surge, the humble potato — long derided as a boring tuber prone to making you fat — is being rediscovered as a nutritious crop that could cheaply feed an increasingly hungry world. Potatoes, which are native to Peru, can be grown at almost any elevation or climate: from the barren, frigid slopes of the Andes Mountains to the tropical flatlands of Asia. They require very little water, mature in as little as 50 days, and can yield between two and four times more food per hectare than wheat or rice. ‘The shocks to the food supply are very real and that means we could potentially be moving into a reality where there is not enough food to feed the world,’ said Pamela Anderson, director of the International Potato Center in Lima (CIP), a non-profit scientific group researching the potato family to promote food security. Like others, she says the potato is part of the solution. The potato has potential as an antidote to hunger caused by higher food prices, a population that is growing by one billion people each decade, climbing costs for fertilizer and diesel, and more […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
